Is Ted Cruz, the notorious demagogue, really as smart as so many people say he is?

Monday

Jul 28, 2014 at 12:06 PMJul 28, 2014 at 3:10 PM

If Sen. Ted Cruz, the Texas Republican and Harvard University graduate, is really the smarty-pants he’s reputed to be, how come he says so many dumb things?

Even his critics are quick to hedge their knocks on him with qualifiers about his presumed abundance of gray matter.

Ah, but Nathan Robinson has the nerve to SAY that he’s heard enough of this stuff:

For one thing, it doesn’t seem especially true. It can’t really be that we think Cruz has a sophisticated mind, given that the only thoughts he produces are angry pants-on-fire platitudinous drivel. Even those who lavish praise on his oratory seem to agree that his heat-to-light ratio nears the infinite, and that “thoughtfulness” and Ted Cruz cannot exist in the same room. His only memorable quotes appear to be cheap jokes, and the most notable speech of his entire career is not his own, but Dr. Seuss’. Nobody who has witnessed a few minutes of Cruz’s piece of senatorial performance art would have thought to label him a thinker, were it not for the preexisting consensus that he is one.

Cruz has become notorious for using distortive, misleading rhetoric that no sober-minded individual could apply. Cruz says Obamacare’s “intent is to destroy the private insurance business,” despite the fact that the whole progressive complaint about Obamacare is that it is a massive windfall to insurers. He says a campaign finance amendment attempting to rein in spending literally “repeals the First Amendment.” But even more alarming are the straightforward factual errors. He has mistakenly claimed that most premiums have risen under the Affordable Care Act and that states with gun control have the highest murder rates, among other elementary blunders that earned him a rating on PolitiFact of 10 falsehoods for every one truth.

If Sen. Ted Cruz, the Texas Republican and Harvard University graduate, is really the smarty-pants he’s reputed to be, how come he says so many dumb things?

Even his critics are quick to hedge their knocks on him with qualifiers about his presumed abundance of gray matter.

Ah, but Nathan Robinson has the nerve to SAY that he’s heard enough of this stuff:

For one thing, it doesn’t seem especially true. It can’t really be that we think Cruz has a sophisticated mind, given that the only thoughts he produces are angry pants-on-fire platitudinous drivel. Even those who lavish praise on his oratory seem to agree that his heat-to-light ratio nears the infinite, and that “thoughtfulness” and Ted Cruz cannot exist in the same room. His only memorable quotes appear to be cheap jokes, and the most notable speech of his entire career is not his own, but Dr. Seuss’. Nobody who has witnessed a few minutes of Cruz’s piece of senatorial performance art would have thought to label him a thinker, were it not for the preexisting consensus that he is one.

Cruz has become notorious for using distortive, misleading rhetoric that no sober-minded individual could apply. Cruz says Obamacare’s “intent is to destroy the private insurance business,” despite the fact that the whole progressive complaint about Obamacare is that it is a massive windfall to insurers. He says a campaign finance amendment attempting to rein in spending literally “repeals the First Amendment.” But even more alarming are the straightforward factual errors. He has mistakenly claimed that most premiums have risen under the Affordable Care Act and that states with gun control have the highest murder rates, among other elementary blunders that earned him a rating on PolitiFact of 10 falsehoods for every one truth.